This invention relates in general to the preparation of pattern pieces from sheet material and deals more particularly with an improved method for preparing a pattern piece from a single sheet of material or a layup, which comprises a relatively few plies of sheet material, in response to a predetermined cutting program. The present method is particularly adapted for use in the automated cutting of pattern pieces used in the fabrication of custom garments and the like to facilitae manual or automatic separation of each cut pattern piece from the scrap material produced by the cutting operation.
The pattern pieces which comprise the component parts of a custom garment, such as a suit or shirt, are usually cut on an automated machine from a single sheet of material or fabric spread on a cutting table. The cutting tool or blade used to cut the fabric makes an extremely fine kerf or cut which is barely discernible upon completion of the cutting operation, so that it is difficult to distinguish the cut pattern pieces from the surrounding scrap material. Consequently, cut pattern pieces may be overlooked during the separation process and inadvertently discarded with the scrap resulting in loss of valuable material.
It is highly desirable that all pieces used in the fabrication of a single garment be cut from fabric produced in the same dye lot. The loss of one or more pattern pieces which comprise the component parts of a garment may pose a more serious problem when the garment is assembled. The replacement of a lost pattern piece may result in the introduction of a pattern piece from a different dye lot which may be slightly mismatched with the other pattern pieces which comprise the finished garment. The present invention is primarily concerned with the aforedescribed problems.